DS 195 
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; 1''°''" ' "''\ SENATE {^--ir 






ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM 
AND NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE 



MEMORANDUM 

OF 

ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM AND NATIONAL INDE- 
DEPENDENCE PRESENTED TO THE DEMOCRATIC MID-EUROPE / 
UNION BY DR. G. PASTERMADJIAN^ SPECIAL ENVOY OF HIS - ^ 
HOLINESS, THE CATHOLICOS OF ALL ARMENIANS. AND 
BY MIRAN SEVASLY, CHAIRMAN OF THE ARMENIAN 
NATIONAL UNION OF AMERICA AND REPRE- 
SENTATIVE IN THE UNITED STATES OF THE 
ARMENIAN NATIONAL DELEGATION 




PRESENTED BY MR. LODGE 

December 15 (Calendar day, December 23), 1918.— Referred to the Committee 
on Foreign Relations and ordered to be printed 



/ 



WASHINGTON 

(JOVERNMKNT PRINTING OFFICE 

1919 






2» J919 



^ 



^ 



% 



\) 



V 



ARMENIA AIND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM AND NATIONAL 
INDEPENDENCE. 



Part I. 

TURKISH ARMENIA AND THE ARMENIANS IN TURKEY. 

We firmly believe that by her participation in the present world 
war the United States will powerfully contribute toward cutting 
the Gordian knot which goes by the name of the eastern question, 
with the solution of which the fate of the Armenians is closely 
bound up. 

More than a century ago, Volney, an eminent French thinker and 
philosopher, in an imperishable book, Les Euines, heralded the ap- 
proaching fall of the Ottoman Empire in these striking words : " The 
hour of destiny has arrived; the catastrophe is about to commence." 
He predicted the uprising of all the subject races of Turkey, in- 
cluding the Arabs, the Armenians and others, and his graphic 
description Of the condition of the Turkish Empire, the excesses of 
the, dominant Turk, the sufferings of the conquered races, and the 
grievances of the latter against their " masters " were as true in an 
aggravated form on the threshold of the present war as they were 
when the great philosopher penned it. 

Still the Ottoman Empire survived a century and its emascula- 
tion has been graduaL This was chiefly due to the conflicting in- 
terests in the " great powers " 6i Europe in the East, to the political 
credo prevailing in the chancellaries of Europe that the integrity 
of the Ottoman Empire was essential for the maintenance of the 
European equilibrium in the Near East, without which Turkey 
would have been outlawed long ago and the several historic, progres- 
sive races comprising it emancipated from the yoke of a dominant 
unspeakable military caste. 

An empire that extended from the Caucasus to the Danube and 
from the Bosporus to Carthage is reduced to a territory that com- 
prises a strip of territory in Thrace, Asia Minor, Armenia, Syria, 
and Palestine, Mesopotamia, and Arabia. In turn, Greece, Rou- 
mania, Montenegro, Serbia, and Bulgaria were emancipated from 
Turkish domination. This gradual shrinkage should not be won- 
dered at. The Turks conquered but never assimilated the progres- 
sive, historic, and civilized races of the Near East, whom they always 
designated by the villifying name of Raia. By the very tenets, more- 
over, of Turkey's state doctrine, the conquered races were con- 
sidered " flocks " which have been sent by the Almighty to be fleeced, 
plundered, raped, and massacred whenever they protested against an 
unspeakable tyrannj-. 

We desire to remark here that Islamism, as understood and ap- 
plied by the Turks, is not only as an author qualified it "a^brain 
disease," but it is also an essentially economic question. It is a sort 
of league made up of all the Turkish elements that are unprepared 
for the struggles of modern, strenuous life. They are all animated 



4 ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 

by one identical belief, that they possess the unquestionable right to 
be idle and that they are entitled to make the Armenians and other 
conquered races Avork for them, since by their " diA'ine " law these 
are subjects reduced to a state of a " flock " to be fleeced. 

This idea is the keynote of the whole eastern question. 

Ever since western Europe, through an aberration of a political 
mind, allowed in 1453 the Turks to supplant the cross by the crescent 
at Constantinople the struggle in the Near East has been continuous 
between progressive humanity on the one hand and obscurantism 
and medieval barbarity on the other. There never has been a Turk- 
ish Government in the true sense of the word, a government such as 
is conceived in western Europe or in the United States. " Massacre 
and plunder " has been the invariable Turkish method of suppressing 
complaints of the subject races or for despoiling them for the benefit 
of the dominating race. The massacre of Chios in 1821, of Lebanon 
in 1862, of Batak in 1876, and the appalling ruthless massacres of 
Armenians of the Empire, extending from 1894 to 1896 and in 1909 
and culminating in the deportations and extermination of the same 
race in 1915 and thereafter, establish the veracity of this statement. 

The expulsion of the Turks from Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia, Rou- 
mania, and from the Balkan Peninsula did not solve the near eastern 
question in toto. There remain iVrabia, Armenia, Egypt, and Pales- 
tine unredeemed. 

The alliance between Prussian militarism and Turkish obscurantism 
appears to keen observers a natural one. It is founded on a com- 
munity of interest. Sultan Abdul Hamid inaugurated the under- 
standing with the Kaiser so as to suppress more efficaciously all the 
non-Turkish elements of the Empire and to counteract the reforming 
spirit in the internal affairs of Turkey, with which the western powers 
were animated for the purpose of upholding the "integrity" dogma 
by strengihening the remaining conquered historic " races within 
the Empire. 

This has been the dominant policy of the great powers since the 
Crimean power — a patchwork that crumbled as time proceeded, 
while it could not and did not modify Turkish mentality in the least. 

The charter of Gulhane and of the Hatti Humayoum, issued 
through the '' spontaneous good will " of the Sultan, and which 
claimed to place Christian and Turk on the same level and to secure 
to the former the elementary right that every citizen is entitled to 
possess — security of life, property, and honor — have remained a dead 
letter. Every bill of right conferred by the different Sultans during 
the nineteenth century on his Christian subjects has been preceded or 
followed by a recrudescence of persecution or massacres fomented 
and organized by the. authorities. These were intended to be "" mani- 
festations " for the information of the European public against the 
recognition of civic rights to the subject races. 

We need not rehearse here the whole sickening story of the unre- 
deemed pledges of reform, which is admirably exposed in the work of 
Mr. Edward Engelhard, La Turque et le Tauzimat, where the Prench 
diplomatist and erudite conclusively establishes that " reforms " in 
Turkey were an exotic plant " adopted " by the Turkish statesmen so 
as to throw dust in the eyes of Europe, which was clamoring for them, 
and for the purpose of warding off an impending danger in the w^ay 
of a European intervention. 



ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 5 

The promulgation of the Turkish constitution of 187G — revived in 
1908 — has also been attributed to the same inherent causes, to the 
application of the same policy of prevarication, fraud, and make- 
beliefs as the events of the last 30 years have amply demonstrated. 
We need only recall that the Adana massacres of 1909, a year after 
the promulgation of the so-called Turkish constitution, were carried 
out by the soldiery under the command of Turkish officers, some of 
whom had obtained their military training in Germany. 

While the Turkish riders Avere, on the one hand, hoodwinking 
Europe with formal promises of reforms and with declarations con- 
ve.ving assurances regarding the betterment of the condition of the 
Christian populations of the Ottoman Empire, they were, on the 
other hand, systematically carrying on a policy of extermination of 
the non-Turkish elements. This has been especially so since the 
Paris treaty, of 185G, which recognized the "integrity of the Otto- 
man Empire "" n^j\n essential article of international faith. When 
in 18G2 the governor of Erzereum, Khaireddin Pasha, a Tunisian 
in the service of Turkey, reported to the Sublime Porte that the 
Armenians of Van, and Erzereum were emigrating in great num- 
bers to escape the excesses of the Turkish officials, the depredations 
and acts of plunder committed by the Kurds and other predatory 
tribes, the grand vezir, Aali Pasha, the " great reformer," wrote 
back to instruct the governor "not to interfere in state affairs, that 
the Armenians can alaandon their country and emigrate, as they will 
easily be supplanted by Mohammedan population from without. '' 

To the policy of the extermination of non-Turks, Turkish states- 
manship adliered to ever since with pertinacity until the war, when 
it considered this a favorable opportunity of giving it the finishing 
touch. We need only recall the awful story of the Armenian gen- 
eral massacres and deportations, the details of which are faithfully 
recorded in the archives of the State Department. 
s<:T5ut we desire to throw a retrospective glance. In 1876, at the 
time of the Turco-Eussian War, the grievances of the Armenians in 
Turkey may be summarized as follows : 

1. The practical absence of political and civil equality. 

2. The discrimination against non-Moslem evidence in the Turkish 
courts of justice. 

3. The systematic pillage and destruction of Armenian villages, 
the sacking of Armenian public edifices, the perpetration of all kinds 
of crimes and oppressive acts by the police, by officials, and by 
nomadic tribes aided and abetted in this by the authorities. 

' -1. The venality of justice. 

5. The systematic efforts to crush and ruin the peasant classes 
(1) by heavy taxes, (2) by expropriations, (3) by forcing them to 
abandon their holdings. 

6. By forced conversion to Islam. 

7. The systematic kidnapping of Armenian maidens and their in- 
corporation in Turkish harems. 

These were the elements that constituted the Armenian question. 
They are minutely set forth in numerous documents, in the reports 
of British consuls from 1840 to 1881, in the French Yellow Books, 
in the statement of travelers, and reliable and unbiased witnesses, 
and form an arsenal of facts and documents scientifically compiled 
in 1890 by Mr. Rolin Jacquennms in his L'Armenie, les Armenians 



6 ABMENIA AND HEB CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 

et le Traites, published ill the Review of International LaAv of 
Bruxelles, 

The Armenians hoped and waited and waited and hoped for the 
redress of their grievances by constant appeals to their " masters. " 
The Turkish rulers instead of alleviating these bitter complaints, 
aggi'avated them and in truth none had been removed up to 1914, 
constitutions, bills of rights, and declarations to the contrary, not- 
withstanding. 

The enmitj' of the Turk to commerce and civilization is easily 
demonstrated. Armenia by her industrj-, resources, and genius once 
supported a population of over 20,000,000, yet since it was brought 
under Turkish rule its natural resources remained undeveloped, pas- 
ture and arable lands w^ere abandoned and falling out of cultivation, 
rivers choked up, roads broken, so that the country was fast becom- 
ing a drear}^ waste. To a similar pitiful condition were reduced the 
Balkan States. But since the Tartar foot departed from these 
countries even the most enthusiastic supporters of Turkey have been 
compelled to confess their admiration in manj^ ways for these 
gallant little States. 

Despairing of obtaining redress from their masters, the Armenians 
took occasion on the approach of the Russian Army to Constanti- 
nople in 1876 to appeal to Imperial Russia. 

The treaty of San Stefano, in its article 16, makes special refer- 
ence to the Armenians, and the treaty of Berlin, which substituted it, 
places the protection of the life, property, and honor of the Ar- 
menians under the collective control and guaranty of Europe. 

The Anglo-Turkish convention of 1878, by which the administra- 
tion of Cyprus was transferred to Great Britain, established a sort 
of British protectorate over Asia Minor, and while it resulted in the 
withdrawal of the Russians from Erzerum, it did not in any way 
benefit the Armenians. England ceased to send military consuls to 
Asia Minor in 1882 and the country was again exposed to the tender 
mercies of a hostile government. In a sense, the Berlin treaties and 
the Cyprus convention have done more harm than good. They raised 
hopes in the minds of the Armenians which were not realized, and 
the Turkish statesmen used every effort and strained every nerve to 
stamp these hopes out, either by exiling as many Armenians as they 
could from the soil of their ancestors or by fostering and encourag- 
ing Kurdish depredations, Circassian inroads, or by harassing re- 
ligion and the schools. 

The nomenclature of these outrages and misdeeds in Armenia are 
too long to be recited here, but the intolerable griefs and sufferings 
had culminated to such a point that the Armenians felt bound to 
appeal again to Europe by periodicals and publications in English 
and French or by sending deputations to Governments of the great 
powers, who had assumed the obligation of protecting this historic 
race. The Armenians were clearly realizing that unless drastic 
measures were taken by the concert, of Europe they were doomed to 
extermination in the Ottoman Empire. Legitimate meetings, organ- 
ized by the Armenians within the empire and without, were taken 
advantage of by Abdul Hamid to organize the general massacres of 
1894 to 1896, the details of which are amply recorded in the official 
Blue Books and Yellow Books. After the massacres there was some 
hope of the introduction of positive reforms in the Armenian Prov- 



ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 7 

inces, but one of the greatest stumbling blocks for the realization of 
a reform program was the Government of Germany, who in return 
for a concession of a railway to Bagdad and other benefits, practi- 
cally acquiesced in the policy of setting at naught the reforms in- 
tended to benefit not only the Armenian, but all the other inhabitants. 
The attempt made by England under Lord Salisbury to coerce the 
Turkish Government was also frustrated by the Government of the 
Czar. The diplomatic history of the last 30 years in connection with 
the solution of the Armenian question amply reveals that the Porte 
adroitly took advantage of the want of harmonious cooperation 
among the powers to play havoc with the Armenian population of 
Turkey for the purpose of creating a Turkey for the Turks exclu- 
sivel3\ We need not refer in any detail to the so-called constitution 
of 1908, which was a snare and make-belief and which resulted in the 
Adana massacres, to which reference is given above, and to the 
deportations of a large section of the Armenian people during the 
year 1915 and thereafter, with the appalling and tragic results which 
have stirred the conscience of the civilized world. 

Part II. 

THE SITUATION OF THE ARMENIANS, INCLUDING TRANSCAUCASIA 
AND TURKEY, PRIOR TO THE PRESENT WORLD WAR. 

When the present international war commenced, the number of 
Armenians living in the three Empires among which the country of 
Armenia is divided, viz, Russia, Turkej^, and Persia, amounted to 
4,276,000. Out of this number 3,406,000' inhabited on the soil of the 
historic land of Armenia, while the remaining 870,000 were scattered 
in different parts of the three Empires aforementioned. This circum- 
stance demonstrates per se how the Armenian has tenaciously stuck to 
the land of his ancestors, notwithstanding the indisputable historic 
fact that no other nation on earth has undergone such vicissitudes and 
has shed so much of its precious blood for its national existence, ever 
since the fourth century anno Domini to the present day, during 
which long period it has become the standard bearer in the Near 
East — on the confines of Asia and Europe— of the ideas of civiliza- 
tion, liberty, and Christendom. Whereas other neighbors of the 
Armenians, who Avere exposed to the same fate, like the Jews and the 
Assyrians, do not present to-day the same conditions. The number of 
Israelites at present is more than 10,000,000 throughout the universe, 
but hardly 100,000 of these are on the soil of their historic father- 
land; while the number of Assyrians, who in the distant past was com- 
puted by historians at about 30,000,000 sovils, is at present reduced 
to hardly half a million survivors within the limits of the Ottoman 
Empire. But this number again has abandoned the land of its sires 
to find refuge in the mountains of Armenia and in the neighborly 
friendliness of the Armenians. 

Let us now briefly set forth in what proportions the Armenians 
are located in the three Empires above referred to. The statistical 
information regarding the Armenians in Russian Armenia has been 
obtained from the official Russian census returns published in Janu- 
ary of 191.5, whereas what concerns the number of Armenians in 
Turkish Armenia are derived from the official archives of the Ar- 
menian Patriarchate of Constantinople prepared in 1912. The num- 



O AEMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 

ber of Armenians in Turkey in the year 1914 may be summed up as 
follows: 

A. Within the limits of the country Icnown as Turkish Armenia, 
the numbers are given against each of the Provinces that constitute 
the Armenian Provinces, to wit: 

1. Vilayet of Erzerenm 215,000 

2. Vilayet of Van 185^000 

3. Vilayet of Bitlis : 180,000 

4. Vilayet of Harpoot 168,000 

5. Vilayet of Diarbekir 105,000 

6. Vilayet of Sivas 165,000 

7. Vilayet of Adana and Marash country, knovv'n as Gilicia 407, 000 

Total 1, 425, 000 

Armenians inhabiting Constantinople, Smyrna, Thrace, and other 
parts of Turkish Empire . 678, 000 

Grand total 2, 103. 000 

B. Armenians in Russia in 1914: 

1. Within the lijaits oi Transcaucasia Province of Plrivnn 750,000 

2. Elizabethpol 450,000 

3. Tillis 400, 000 

4. Kars - 130, 000 

5. Bak<m 128, 000 

1, 858, 000 
Northern ]);irt of the Caucasus and rlirouiiiiout Russia 150,000 

Total 2, 008, 000 

C. Armenians in Persia : 

1. In the Province of Aderbeijan 120, 000 

2. In other parts of Persia .- 45,000 

Total ^ 165, 000 

From the above statistical returns it will be seen that no less than 
3,403,000 Armenians wei'e living on the soil of their fatherland on 
both sides of the Turco-Russian frontiers at the time when the pres- 
ent world Avai- broke out. And. by reason of her geographical posi- 
tion, Armenia be.'ame again the battle field of warring nations, and 
the Armenian people, faithful to their historic traditions and to 
their progressive past, at the very risk of their national existence, 
threw their lot on the side of the cause of justice and of civilization. 
The blood of the sons of Armenia was shed in torrents, in a way not 
commensurate with their numb?rs. Doubtless the historian of the 
future will record the indisputable fact that in this gigantic strug- 
gle among the warring nations, the smallest but the oldest of races, 
the Armenian, has proportionately offered greater sacrifices in blood 
on the altar of human liberty. 

Before dilating u])on the present claims of the Armenians, for the 
realization of which they have undergone such heavy sacrifices, may 
we be perntitted to picture the conditions of the Armenian at the 
outlook of this Avar in the three empires between Avhich Armenia is 
partitioned. 

We will deal with each section separately. 

Persian Armenia^ which forms a part of the Persian Province of 
Aderbeijan, has been under Persian domination since the fifth cen- 
tury anno domini, although at different periods subsequent, it was 



ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM, 9 

united with tlio Armenian Kingdom of Vun under th' Arzrouni 
dynasty. The Armenians in Persian Armenia are the survivors of 
a much larger se. tion of the race Avhose numbei' has been depleted 
by reason of the successive conquests and raids of migratory tribes 
like the Tartars, Mongols, and Turks, that ov( rran that pa-rt of the 
•country in their successive onward inarches toward the heart of 
Asia Minor. Notwithstanding the smallness of their number, the 
Armenians in Persia play a vital purt in vai'ious Avalks of life. They 
have held important public offices; they have given statesmen, am- 
bassadors, and military leaders to Persia; and the mercantile activity 
of that country with many quarters of the glob > is in their hands. 
We may mention the names of the late Malcolm Han, ambassador to 
the Court of St. James; Nariman Han, ambassador to Vienna ; Ohan- 
nes Han Masseghian, ambassador to Berlin, and others, who each 
and all were Armenians in the service of Persia. We think it is not 
-out of place to recall the part played by Armenians in the reform 
.und constitutional movement, one of whose principal leaders was an 
Armenian, Eprem Plan and his associates, who Avere instrumental in 
introducing in the body politic of that Asiatic land the western ideas 
of progress and democracy and did not disdain to sacrifice their very 
lives for their realization. 

In the fifth century, when the Persians w^ere at the height of their 
power, they made attempts to impose on the Armenians by sheer 
Tiolence their religious beliefs and compel them to forsake their 
national ideals. The struggle lasted about a century; and finding 
after protracted wars that it is impossible to make Armenians relin- 
quish the tenets of their Christian faith and nationality, they altered 
their attitude and adopted a more tolerant policy toward them. For 
centuries ever since the Persians and Armenians have lived together 
as peaceful neighbors Avithout the sanguinary conflicts Avhich have 
characterized the Turco-Armenian relations since the Turkish con- 
quest of part of Armenia. Although the Persiaas liaA^e mostly em- 
braced Mohammedanism, but descending from an Aryan stock like the 
Armenians and being possessed of ancient culture and ciAnlization, 
they haA'e not displa^^ed toAvard the Armenians the savagery and bru- 
tal conduct Avith Avhich the Touranian races, to Avhich the Turks 
belong, have familiarized the civilized Avorlcl eA'er since they sup- 
planted the cross by the crescent in the Near East. 

NotAvithstanding these somcAvhat bearable conditions prevailing 
m Persian Armenia — so contiguous to the Armenian Province of 
Van — the Armenians of Salmast, Khoi, and Makou, the principal 
Armenian-Persian centers in Aderbaijan, all aspire to see that part 
of their country one day united and form an inseparable part of a 
Magna Armenia. 

Russian Artnen'/a. — The part of historic Armenia Avhich is under 
Eussian SAvay is included in the Transcaucasian Provinces of Russia. 
It was conquered hy the Russians in the early part of the nineteenth 
century and wrested from Persia. Before the Russian conquest 
Transcaucasia Avas divided betAveen a number of Khanates and Meli- 
kates (small self-governing principalities). The Khans Avere Tar- 
tars by origin and ruled mostly oA^er Tartars, Avhile the Meliks Avere 
Armenian feudal lords, and their domination extended over the 
Armenian districts of Carabagh. All these diiferent principalities 
were tributary to the Persian Government. Neighboring these de- 



10 ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 

pendencies to the northwest there existed a Georgian Kingdom, 
including the present Provinces of Tifiis and Kubias. Georgia, be- 
ing squeezed in between two powerful Moslem countries like Persia 
and Turkej^, and subject to permanent attacks from these quarters, 
appealed^ toward the end of the eighteenth, century, to the 
Empress Catherine for protection and help. At this juncture, in 
the year 1787, the Armenian Meliks of Carabagh took occasion to 
send a delegation to the Russian court praying for Eussian assistance 
against Tartar neighbors, who were in constant conflict with them. 
The Eussian Government promised immediate help to both Arme- 
nians and Georgians, and, moreover, undertook, in so far as the 
Armenians were concerned, to free them from Persian domination 
and to organize a new Armenian State made up of the Armenian 
Provinces under the suzerainty of Russia. 

Encouraged b}^ these promises, both Armenians and Georgians 
placed all their military forces at the disposal of Russia and power- 
fully contributed to bring about the conquest of Transcaucasia from 
Persia. But, unfortunately, the solemn promises of the Empress 
Catherine were not fulfilled and the conquered territory was brought 
under Russian sway. It was through the enforcement of this method 
that Georgia and part of historic Armenia, including Echmadzin, 
the seat of the supreme head of the Armenia church and nation, 
were annexed by Russia. 

The policy of Russia ever since these conquests appears to have had 
a single purpose, viz, to Russianize and assimilate the Armenians 
and Georgians. The Georgians, being members of the Eastern Greek 
Church, and hence of the same religious denomination as the Russian, 
were more easily amenable to Russification than were the Armenians, 
who, having a national separate church of their own, were more 
jealous of their national traditions. This circumstance provoked the 
enmity of the Russian Government toward them. The policy of 
Russification was strengthened more and more, and in 1903 the 
Armenian schools were closed and all national Armenian property 
confiscated by an imperial ukase issued by the now deposed Em- 
peror Nicholas II. The Armenians did not, however, Avillingly submit 
to these arbitrary acts and opposed violence to violence, and in cer- 
tain sections of the Transcaucasus several Armenians were killed 
by Russian soldiers. The illustrious Khrimian, the Catholicos of all 
Armenians and the idol of the nation, scorning exile to Siberia-at the 
age of 80, in an historic document addressed to the Omnipotent Czar 
of All Russia, declared that he, as the custodian of the centuries-old 
heritage of the Armenian Nation, refused to abide by such an unjust 
decree. As a result, the prisons in the Transcaucasus were filled with 
hundreds of Armenians, and many others belonging to the intellec- 
tual classes were exiled to Siberia. But the Russian administration 
did not rest here. It went further. It incited the Tartars of the 
Transcaucasus against the Armenians. It distributed firearms among 
the Tartars of Bakou and Elizabethpol and gave them carte blanche 
to plunder ind kill their Armenian neighbors, and organized po- 
groms as it did with Russian Jews. 

In Februar}^, 1905, the Tartars of Baku and elsewhere began their 
unprovoked onslaught on the Armenians under the very eyes of the 
Russian police, who remained passive observers of these sanguinary 
scones. Those attacks were extended suddenly to other centers like 



ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 11 

Elizabethpol, Shoushi, Eriven, and Nakhitehan, and took the Ar- 
menians by surprise. The Armenians were aware that the reaction- 
ary policy of Russia, which had prevailed since the advent to the 
throne of Emperor Alexander III, was a nti -Armenian m its essence. 
They also knew that after the general massacres of the Armenians 
in Turkey in 1895 and 1896, Count Lebanoff, the Russian foreign 
minister, declared Russia was eager to have Turkish Armenia, but 
without the Armenians, whom he did not care to save. All these 
circumstances notwithstanding, the Armenians in Russia could never 
imagine that a Christian power like Russia would countenance and 
authorize the Mohammedan element in the Transcaucasus to assume 
a hostile attitude toward them. But the facts were staring the 
Armenians in the face. There was no time to lose. They at once 
organized themselves for self-defense and Transcaucasia became the 
theater of a civil war. between these two elements which lasted a 
whole j^ear under the very eyes of the Russian authorities, who 
only interfered when they realized that the Tartars were being 
worsted by the ArmeniaiUs. The Armenians lost 1,556, while the 
loss of the Tartars during these frays amounted to 5,635 men, and 
this disproportion of the fallen is due to the admirable organization 
of the Armenians, who, notwithstanding their being somewhat nu- 
merically inferior to their assailants, were able on the spur of the 
moment to organize their forces for self-defense. But the material 
injuries inflicted on the Armenians were much greater than those 
borne b}^ the Tartars. 

It would, however, be fair to state here that, notwithstanding the 
Russian bureaucratic methods of government and all its deficiencies 
and its hostile policj' toward the Armenians, the latter nevertheless 
enforced in the Transcaucasus certain elementary rights of existence 
of which they have ever been deprived in Turkey — which enabled them 
to develop their moral and material resources, to increase in numbers, 
and to become the most forward element of the Transcaucasus in all 
the branches of human activity. In proof of this we desire to recall 
that in 1836 the number of Armenians under Russian domination 
amounted to about 300,000 as against 500,000 Georgians and 700,000 
Tartars. In 1915, according to official statistics, the number of Ar- 
menians swelled to 1,858,000, that of the Georgians to 1,450,000, and 
of the Tartars to 2,040,000. The large increase of Armenians may be 
also explained by the influx of Armenian refugees from Turkey ; but 
the real cause of this increase is due principally to the fact that the 
Armenians are a prolific race, with strong family virtues. The official 
Russian statistics demonstrate that the rate of increase per year of 
these different races is as follows : 

Per cent. 

Armenian.s 2. .5 

Georgians ; 1. 5 

Tartars i . 9 

We can not close this chapter without alluding to the intellectual 
and cultural progress of the Armenians under Russia. (^There in the 
Transcaucasus throve in a marked degree Armenian literature which 
produced a galaxy of writers, poets, novelists, historians, whose 
writings are to some degree permeated with the ideas of the most 
liberal Russian leaders of thought.\ These ideas in return brought 
to bear the weight of their influence on the minds of their Armenian 



12 AKMENIA AND HEK CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 

compatriots across the border into Turkish Armenia, toward whose 
struggles for emancipation from the Turkish yoke the Armenians of 
Russia greatly contributed. 

When the present war broke out the Armenians of Russia forgot 
for a moment all the just complaints against Russian bureaucracy and, 
without hesitation or equivocation, espoused the cause of the allies, 
including Russia, with the hrm conviction that the victorj'^ of the 
allies would end their sufferings and would recognize their inalien- 
able rights to self-government. Besides contributing 160,000 men to 
the Rusisan Army, thej^ organized several volunteer corps, whose 
deeds of valor on the battlefield were officially recognized by M. Saza- 
nofF, the foreign minister, in his address to the Duma. 

Without the contribution of the Armenian contingents to the Rus- 
sian Army in the Caucasus the Turkish offensive against the Trans- 
caucasus in 1914 and 1915 would have been crowned with success, 
more especially having regard to the fact that the sympathies of the 
Tartar and Georgian population of the Transcaucasus were mani- 
f estl}?^ pro-Teutonic and pro-Turk. The success of such an offensive in 
the years 1914 and 1915 would have enabled the Turkish armies to 
secure a footing at Baku, and all its oil wells and Persian Afghan- 
istan—the gates to India — would have been placed at the mercy of the 
Germanic-Turkish forces. This active participation of the Russian 
Armenians at this crucial phase of the world war was publicly recog- 
nized by the Young Turk leaders, who invoked this circumstance to 
justify the Turkish savageries perpetrated against the Armenians of 
Turkey. 

Let it be said, moreover, that after the disruption of Russia, 
through the triumph of bolshevism and the withdrawal of the Rus- 
sian troops from the Caucasian front in January, 1918, it was the 
Armenian contingents solely that held the line against the Turkish 
onslaughts and thereby helped the Mesopotamian wing of the British 
Army hj preventing the Turkish troops on the Caucasian front 
from joining the Turkish armies operating against the British. The 
Armenians held the line until September, 1918, and it was after 
hard-fought battles that the Turks were able to reach Baku, the 
British expeditionary force sent to join hands with them not arriv- 
ing in due time, and those that did arrive were insufficient in 
numbers. 

These services have been officially acknowledged in official dis- 
patches by the British Government, and we take occasion to repro- 
duce the following extract from a letter, dated the 3d of October. 
1918, signed by the undersecretary of state, Robert Cecil, and ad- 
dressed to Lord James Bryce : 

The Baku Armenians were not only an isolated remnant, but no doubt their 
task was made impossible frimi the outset by the disorsani/.ation which pre- 
vailed and had thrown open to the Turks the Transcaucasian Railway leading 
to the gates of the city. Whatever may have happened at Baku, the responsi- 
bility can not be laid at the door of the Armenian people. 

The national delegation, conunissioned by his holiness tlie Katholikos in 
1918 to ol)tain from the civilized world that justice to Armenia which has 
been delayed with such teri'ible consequences, have given many proofs, under 
the distinguished presidency of his excellency Boghos Xubar Pasha, of theii 
devotion to the cause of the allies as being the cause of all peoples striving to 
free the world from oppression. 

The council at Erivan threw itself into the breach which the Russian brealv- 
down left open in Asia, and after organizing resistance to the Turks in the 



ABMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 13 

CiUU'Jisus from February to June this year was at leustli couipelletl l)y main 
force to suspend hostilities. Great Britain and lier allies understand the 
cruel necessity which has force<l the Ai-nieniaus to take this step and look 
forwaiTl to the time. ])erl)aps not far distant, when allied victories may reverse 
their undeserved misfortunes. 

INIeanwliile, the .services of the Armenians to the connuon cause, to which 
you refer in your letter, have assuredly not been forfjotten ; and I venture to 
mention four points which the Armenians may, I think, rej^iai-d as the charter 
of their I'isht to liberation at the hand of the allies: 

(1) In the autunm of 1914 the Turks sent emissaries to the national congress 
of the Ottoman Armeniiins, then sittinti at p]rzerum, and made them offers of 
autonomy if they would actively assist Turkey in the war. The Armenians 
replied that they would do their duty individually as Ottoman subjects, Imt 
that as a nation they could not work for the cause of Turkey and her allies. 

(2) On account, in part, of this courageous refusal the Ottoman Armenians 
were systematically unii-dered by the Turkish Government in 1915. Two-thii'ds 
of the po[»ulation were exterminated by the most cold-bh»oded and tiendisli 
methods — niore than TOO.OW people — men, women, and children alike. 

(3) From the beginning of the war that half of the Armenian Nation which 
was under the sovereignty of Russia organized volunteer forces and, under 
their heroic- leader, Andranik, bore the brunt of some of the heaviest fighting 
in the Caucasian cam])aigns. 

(4) After the breakdown of the Russian Army at th(y end of last year these 
Armenian forces took over ^he Caucasian front and for five months delayed 
tlie advance of the Turks, thus rendering an important service to the British 
Army in IVIesopotamia. Tliese operations in the region of Aiexandropol and 
Erivan were, of course, unconnected with those at Baku. 

I may add that Armenian soldiers are still fighting m the ranks of the allied 
forces in Syria. They are to be found serving alike in the British, French, and 
American arnries. and they ha^e borne tleir part in Gen. Allenby's great victory 
in Palestine. 

From the above-mentioned uncontrovertible facts it is conclusively 
established that the Armenians from the begiruiing of the war, and 
notwithstanding the justifiable mistrust which they have maintained 
toward the aims of Russian imperialism, have stood by and been loyal 
to the allied cause in the Near East, and they rendered not only 
appreciable military service but also jeopardized their very existence 
in Turkey, where more than a million of Armenians, men, women, 
and children, were ruthlessly massacred and exterminated by reason 
of their proally attitude. 

Part III. 
WHAT ARP: the claims OF THE ARMENIANS? 

Having regard to the historic past of the Armenians, and to the 
fact that even at present they constitute the most civilized and pro- 
gressive and producing elements in the environments in which they 
live, thej expect their final deliverance as the result of the present 
war. 

As before stated, half of the Armenian population inhabited within 
the limits of Russian Transcaucasia, while the other half, numbering 
about 2,100,000, were in Turkey. Faithful to its past methods, the 
Turkish Government, taking adAantage of the opportunities pre- 
sented by the present war, attempted to solve the Armenian question 
by exterminating that part of the Armenian ]:)opulation which was in 
a majority within the frontiers of its historic fatherland. 

It is estimated that the number of Armenians slaughtered in 1915 
by the agents of the Turkish Government amounted to from 600,000 
to 1,000,000. Let us suppose for a moment that not a single xVrmenian 
out of the 2,100,000 has escaped the hands of the Tui'kish executioner. 



14 ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 

We claim that however reduced the number ol' Armenians may l)e 
to-day their homelands of 1914 should belong to the survivors. 

According to laws of all civilized people, including the Sheri law, 
no murderer can inherit the property of the victim of his crime. 
That inheritance or estate must pass not to the murderer but to the 
next of kin of the victim. 

We leave to the future to determine the exact number of Armenian 
victims as the result of the massacres and so-called deportations of 
1915. We are not, however, far from the truth in asserting that at 
least 1,000,000 Armenians have been saved out of the 2,100,000 Ar- 
menians who inhabited Turkish Armenia in 1914. This million of 
survivors includes the 300,000 Aremenians who have sought refuge 
in the Transcaucasus, as also about 200,000 Armenians who have 
migrated to America, Egypt, and Europe. 

To this million must be added the 2,000,000 Armenians of the 
Transcaucasus. These 3,000,000 Armenians are those who can lay 
claim to the heritage of which the present Turkish Government has 
attempted to deprive them by methods known to all. 

The Armenian people venture to hope that this appalling crime is 
going to be the last act in the sanguinary history of the Ottoman 
Empire, which has for the last five centuries exposed to ruin and 
desolation and massacre the cradles of civilization and religion. It 
is impossible to conceive that the present civilized world will permit 
a race with such a criminal record and government to continue un- 
restrained and unpunished to exterminate peoples superior to it in 
culture and usefulness, such as the Armenians, the Greeks, the Arabs, 
and the Jews. 

The complete liquidation of the Ottoman Empire should be in- 
volved, and it will be incumbent on the Areopagus of nations to 
handle the same at the coming peace congress, together with the solu- 
tion of the Armenian question. The dissolution of the Ottoman 
Empire should have been brought about a century ago, soon after the 
Greek war of independence, and mankind would thereby have been 
spared much innocent blood. We are convinced that the participation 
of the United States in the present war will be instrumental in bring- 
ing about a solution of the near eastern and Armenian questions, not 
by the methods of an antiquated European diplomacy, but in a spirit 
of fair play to satisfy the just claims of the various long-suffering 
people of the Near East concerned. 

Before dealing with the Armenian question let us be permitted to 
submit the produs procedendi, which in our opinion must be followed 
in order to insure a radical and equitable solution of the entire near 
eastern problem. 

The allies have on many occasions proclaimed the right of nations 
to self-determination. On the basis of this fundamental principle, 
the peoples and races inhabiting the Ottoman Empire are entitled to 
receive from that morally and materially bankrupt State a territory 
as their share proportionate to the numbers which each of them had 
prior to 1914, and not according to the respective number of their 
present depleted populations, for the simple reason that human con- 
science can not in any way sanction the murders and forced deporta- 
tions premeditated and carried into effect by the Turkish Govern- 
ment for the purpose of " reducing " the number of the non-Turkish 
population of the Empire. It follows that if 500,000 Armenians 



ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 15 

haAe survived out of a population of 2,100,000 the former are fully 
entitled to such territory as should be allotted to the 2,100,000 Ar- 
menians who were in existence in 1914. Otherwise we would be 
putting a premium on crime. 

Let us now consider which are, in their respective numbers, the 
populations composing the Turkish Empire, and in what way or 
manner can satisfaction be given to its different elements on historical 
and ethnological grounds. 

After the Balkan War the Turkish Government held sway over 
a territory covering an area of about 1,800,000 square kilometers in 
round figures. This area does not include the deserts of Mesopotamia 
and Arabia, but only the inhabited territories which constituted the 
Ottoman Empire "Vilayets" (Provinces). 

In this immense territory of. 1,800,000 square kilometers, which 
covers an area about four times the size of France, was a population 
of between eighteen and twenty millions. Armenia, alone, in the past, 
as history tells us, had a prosperous population of 26,000,000, whereas 
Mesopotamia, now with hardly 806,000 inhabitants, had in the dis- 
tant past 28,000,000 souls, these 18,000,000 of inhabitants were 
made up approximately as follows : 

Arabs (incluaing Syrians) ."), 900, 000 

Armenians 2, 100, 000 

Greelis 1, 800, 000 

Otlier Christian races 1,200,000 

Kurds — 1 700, 000 

Kizilliaches 500,000 

Jews 400,000 

Non-Turldsli races 12, 600, 000 

Tnrlvs 5, 400, 000 

Total 18, 000, 000 

These 5,400,000 Turks comprise Circassian and Mahommedan tribes 
who have migrated froni the Caucasus into Asia Minor, and whose 
number is about 300,000, as also some other minor races whose origin 
is not Turkish and whose religion is not Mohammedan but whose 
vernacular is Turkish, like the Tahtadji tribes in the Cilician regions. 

The inference to be drawn from these figures is that the Turks, who 
are the dominant race in the Empire, constitute one-third of the 
entire population, a minority who prej^ on a majority. There was a 
time when the Turkish race, or rather the military caste that goes 
under this name, did not represent even the one-twentieth, nay, the 
one-hundredth of the entire population of the Empire. This was 
five centuries prior, when the limits of the Empire extended from the 
Persian Gulf to Algeria and from the outskirts of Vienna to Egypt 
in the south. 

In this phase of Turkish history the " subject " races were compara- 
tivel}^ much less exposed to exploitation by having to " feed" their 
then masters than they are now when it is computed that every two 
non-Turks — subjects of the Empire — have to feed and maintain one 
parasite Turk. This is one of the secrets of the decay of the Otto- 
man Empire. 

Let us now consider how the national claims of Armenia should be 
adjusted and the national aspirations realized. Armenian territory 
in Turkey includes the six Armenian vilayets and the Province of 



16 ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 

Cilicia, in accordance with the solemn declaration contained in 
diplomatic documents of the six great powers of Europe. 

The areas covered by these administrative divisions are as follows: 

Square 
kilometers. 

Vilavet of Erzertnim 49,700 

Vilayet of Bitlis : 27, 100 

Vilayet of Van 39, 300 

Vilayet of Harpoot 32,900 

Vilayet of Diarbekir 37, 500 

Vilayet of Sivas 62,100 

Vilayet of Adana 39,900 

District of Marasli 20.000 

Total - 308,500 

The Turkish Government, so far back as 1878, anticipating the 
"Armenian danger," arbitrarily' modified the lilnits of the Armenian 
Provinces, with a vieAv to swelling the numbers of Moslems and mak- 
ing it appear that the Turks are in a majority. Thus the frontiers 
of Sivas and Diarbekir and Adana were enlarged so as to indude re- 
gions not inhabited by Armenians. If we are to sever from the above 
three vilayets those portions which have been artificially added to the 
original provincial delimitations, we obtain a total approximate area 
of 220,000 square kilometers, wherein the Armenian element was in 
the majority in the year of 1911. 

The following is the return of the popidations inhabiting Armenia, 
presented by the Armenian Patriarchate in 1912 to ambassadors of 
the great powers at Constantinople when the question of Armenian 
reforms was again on the tapis in 1912 : 

Armenians 1, 425, 000 

Assyrians - . 123. 000 

Kizilbashes — • 220, 000 

Yezidis 37, 000 

Mahommendau Kurds 424, 000 

Turks — 871, 000 

Total 3. 100, 000 

The Armenians representee! 10 per cent, the Turks 28 per cent, the 
Kurds 13.7 per cent, of the population of the t;aid Provinces, while 
the remaining percentage of 12.3 per cent was made up of non- 
Turkish or non-Mahonnnedan elements. It was with a view to modi- 
fying this proportion of numbers that the Ottoman Government for 
the last 10 years has had re: ourse to periodical massacres culuiinating 
in the 1915 tragic events. By disposing of the Armenians, Turkish 
statesmen considered they were getting rid of the Armenian ques- 
tion once for all. 

To sum up, the Armenians are fully entitled, according to their 
numbers, on historical, geographical, and ethnological grounds, to a 
territory covering an area of 280,000 square kilometers, extending 
from the Gulf of Alexandretta (known as Sea of Armenia in medie- 
val times) to the Russo-Persian frontier. We shall deal separately 
with the natural boundaries of the territory in question. We now 
propose to deal Avith the Turkish race. 

Excluding Syria, Mesopotamia, Kurdistan, Armenia, and Arabia, 
the remaining vilayets of Turkey and central and western Asia 
Minor are the folowing: 



AEMEFIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FEEEDOM. 17 

Square 
kilometer. 

European Turkey : 26, lOO 

District of Ismidt 8, 100 

District of Biglia : 6, 600 

Vilayet of Brussa 65, 800 

Vilayet of Smyrna 55, 800 

Vilayet of Konia 102, 100 

Vilayet of Angora _^ 70, 900 

Vilayet of Kastamouni 50, 700 

Vilayet of Trebizonde 32, 400 

Total 418,000 

Add to these numbers 50,000 square kilometers for the non- 
Armenian regions comprised in the vilayets of Sivas and Adana and 
we get a total of 468,000 square kilometers of territory left for the 
future Turkish State ; but whereas out of the above territory a slice 
of land of the Black Sea should be made part of future Armenia in 
order that she may have an outlet to the, sea, and after disposing of 
the Greek claims in Ionia, there still remain about 400,000 square 
kilometers in Anatolia for the future Turkish State, which will con- 
tain what remains of the Turkish element, aggregating to something 
like 4,000,000 people. 

This solution of the eastern question would not be, we admit, 
palatable to the present rulers of Turkey, but the plain Turkish 
people would welcome it. It insures their future interests in an 
appreciable manner and is preferable to the uncertainty of their 
present condition. It has other advantages. A Turkish State with- 
out " subject " races may be an incentive to the Turks to radically 
modif}^ their modes of living, to cease becoming parasites, and thus 
earn their daily bread with the sweat of their brows. They may 
thereby gradually enter the family of civilized nations. 

But it is opportune to recall that by reason of the destruction of 
Russia and Russian imperialism, and having regard to the newly 
accepted doctrine of self-determination for nations, it is but fair and 
just that a one and indivisible Armenia, including Russian, Persian, 
and Turkish Armenia, should be constituted as one independent 
State. In part of this memorandum we mentioned that there are 
1,856,000 Armenians in the Transcaucasus bordering Turkish Ar- 
menia. It would be natural to unite the fractions torn asunder of the 
Armenian Nation so as to constitute a Magna Armenia made up of 
Russian. Persian, and Turkish Armenia. The Transcaucasian Prov- 
inces, where the Armenians are in a majority, are the following: 

Square 
kilometers. Popalation. 

1. Province of Erivan 27,777 750,000 

2. Province of Kars 18, 749 130, 000 

3. Mountainous district of Elizabethpol 22,000 450,000 

Total 68, 526 1, 330, 000 

Interspersed among this Armenian population there are 545,000 
Mahommedans, Tartars, and Turks, Avhile there are about 526,000 
Armenians scattered in the Georgian and the Tartar Provinces of 
Transcaucasia. This proximity offers great facilities to these dif- 
ferent elements to settle on the respective territories to be allotted to 
them by the peace congress as a result of this world war. 

93207— S. Doc. 316, 65-3 2 



18 ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 

To summarize, the future Armenian State may therefore include: 

Square 
kilometers. 

Turkish Armenia 220, 000 

Russian Armenia 68, 526 

Persian Armenia 15, 000 

Total 303,526 

■In our opinion, the aforementioned should be the boundariies and 
extent of the future Armenian State. The State thus created should 
be able to develop economically in a normal fashion and without 
hindrance, and it will, moreover, be in a position to fulfill its political 
and civilizing mission and become the corner stone of a lasting peace 
in the Near East, with a population of 3,000,000 Armenians and 
with about one million to one million and a half non- Armenian 
elements. 

Part IV. 

WHAT INTEREST HAVE THE ALLIES IN CREATING AN INDEl'ENDENT 

ARMENIA? 

We venture to state that an Armenia created under these condi- 
tions, whose freedom and independence shall be guaranteed by all the 
powers and by a league of nations, will in the Near East play the part 
that Switzerland does in Europe. By reason of her geographical 
position, Armenia is more important than Switzerland, which stands 
between four European powers, two of which belong to the Latin and 
the other two to the Teutonic races. Whereas the Armenian plateau, 
which covers an extensive area between the Black and Mediterranean 
Seas, by the very nature of its exceptional position will not only stand 
between Georgia, Turkey, Syria, the Tartar regions of the Caucasus, 
Persia, Mesopotamia, and Kurdistan, namely, seven different States, 
but being so situated that it has almost become the converging point 
of Europe, Asia, and Africa, is destined also to become the land 
where all races may intermingle and diverge. This is a vital con- 
sideration which requires that a land so situated should be neutral- 
ized so that no Government or people should in any way be able to 
utilize it for purposes of conquest, as has happened so often in the 
past. This in itself is a vital reason for the creation of an Armenia, 
destined to insure the equilibrium in the Near East. 

The immediate services such a State can render will be to obstruct 
the " drang nach Osten " policy of Germany by neutralizing the 
Berlin-Bagdad line that runs through Armenia. Another salutary 
consequence of the creation of such a State would be to arrest the 
Young Turkey's panaslamic and pantouranian aggressive movement 
and to build up a barrier against it. Although the pantouranian 
movement is in its infancy at present, we can not disregard its future 
potentialities and measures ought to be taken to arrest its baneful 
effects, otherwise, it may become as dangerous an element for the 
future of mankind as is Pan Germanism at present, having, more- 
over, in view the circumstance that the center of this pantouranian 
movement Avould be in Berlin and not Constantinople and exploited 
by Germany for the purpose of furthering her designs of domination 
and aggrandizement. Besides these two aggressive movements, there 
may be danger in the future that Imperial Russia, after traversing 
this present phase of dissolution, may emerge triumphant, and in such 



ARMEISTIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FEEEDOM. 19 

a circumstance, a neutralized Armenia would be the only barrier to 
be opposed to a possible aggressive Russia. 

The above political circumstances do not stand alone. There is an- 
other higher justification which renders imperative the restoration 
of Armenia to freedom, and this is in the supreme interests of civil- 
ization. We all know that the enlightened countries of the west have 
inherited their culture from those ancient peoples of the Near East., 
Under the scimitar of the Turks, it has been buried for centuries and 
was threatened with eternal decay. It is high time to restore to the 
east that share of light and progress of which it became the cradle 
and the principal source. To accomplish this, the democratic nations 
of the earth have a duty to perform toward the Armenian people, by 
bringing about their emancipation and insuring their existence 
against final extinction, in order that a people susceptible of the 
highest culture may be able to fulfill its glorious civilizing mission 
in the Near East. 

All the European savants are of the unanimous opinion — and in 
this the German professors concur — that the Armenian represents 
the only element in the Near East that can play the part of the 
intermediary betweei.! the eastern and western world. The Turk, 
the Arab, the Georgian, the Kurd, or the Persian, who are his neigh- 
bors, do not possess the aptitudes to disseminate European and 
.American civilization as does the Armenian. Ethnologists are all 
agreed in stating that the Armenians, being a branch of the Indo- 
European race, settled on the Armenian plateau 27 centuries ago, 
wliiie they embraced Christianity as far back as the fourth century, 
and ever since have kept aloft the ideas of Christian thought and 
civilization against the onslaught of semisavage Asiatic and Moham- 
medan races. The experience they have acquired of a life replete 
Avith vicissitudes and tribulations in their contact with the eastern, 
nations has developed in them extraordinary^ qualities such as no 
other people possess. If the times are ripe in order that the differ- 
ent parts of humanity should be brought more closely in touch with 
each other, so that they may come to an understanding and to create 
more decent relations among them, it is the Armenian who is des- 
tined to become the connecting link between Christianity and Asia. 

CONCLUSIOX. 

After unprecedented vicissitudes and tribulations, the Armenians 
claim a fitting place in the concert of free and independent nations. 
Armenia, like Poland, claims to be one and indivisible, and the 
future Armenian State should by right include Russian, Persian, and 
Turkish Armenia — from the Caucasus to the Straits of Alexandretta. 
To this territor}' Armenia is entitled on historical and ethnological 
grounds, and it is indispensable that the Cilician Provinces of Ar- 
menia bordering on the Gulf of Alexandretta' should be included in 
(Armenia Irredenta. Cilicia was an independent State at the end of 
the fourteenth century. Therein is situated Adana, where the mas- 
sacres of 1909 took place, and there, in the fastnesses of the Taurus, 
the Armenians held their own against Turkish barbarism for cen- 
tu.ries. and in the- course of the nineteenth century fought heroically 
against overwhelming Turkish armies. 

The Armenians do not claim any territory which is not their own, 
nor is it fair that they should accept any solution which does not 



20 ARMENIA AND HER CLAIMS TO FREEDOM. 

voiiciisafe to them an independence such as Greece, Serbia, and; 
Eoumania possess. Massacres and deportations do not constitute 
rights for the Turkish executioners of the Armenian race. The 
number of Armenians has been reduced by reason of these atrocities,; 
but there are at least 3,000,000 survivors of the Armenian holocaust 
' who are entitled to the territory claimed. Greece at the time of her 
^emancipation, in 1829, hardly contained half a million people. Not- 
withstanding, Europe recognized Greek independence after the; 
•Battle of Nefarino, which sealed the death of Turkish dominationj 
in Hellas, whose population has now more than quadrupled. It| 
will be the same of Armenia if she be allowed to develop and breathej 
freely as a sovereign independent State. The thirteen States ofj 
America that revolted against Great Britain at the time of theirj 
liberation did not contain more than 4,000,000 people, and they] 
covered a territory far greater in extent than would the future' 
Armenian State. The argTiment that the Armenian po|)ulation has 
been depleted is a very loose one. To accept the same and to make 
it weigh in the balance against Armenian claims would be to put 
a premium on crime and to legitimatize the massacres and deporta-; 
tions carried out by the Turks during these last 30 years, culminating 
in the events of 1915 and 1916, to which reference is made in the; 
first part of this memorandum. ' 

And let us record here that Armenia, by reason of her civiliza- 
tion in the east, her immeasurable sacrifices, especially her military' 
assistance to the allied cause, in the Caucasus, in Palestine, and in 
France, to which expression is given in the correspondence exchanged 
between Lord Cecil and Lord Bryce, referred to in this memorandum. 
is entitled to complete restoration of her national independence. 
Through the ages her spiritual and patriotic leaders have kept alive 
and alight the flame of national consciousness and self-government, 
despite successive dominations and persecutions. Her political and 
military struggles against Turkish barbarism during the last 30 
years are admirable credentials for her to present to the future 
peace congress. 

The founding of the diminutive Republic of Ararat is a small be- 
ginning for national government for the whole of Armenia, from the 
Caucasus, through Cilicia, to the Mediterranean. Any scheme which 
may be advocated by certain elements in this country having for 
their object to preserve Turkey as a unit are of a nature to defeat the 
imperishable rights of the Armenians to freedom and independence. 
Such schemes are, moreover, detrimental to the cause of the allies and 
to the United States, and unworthy of the noble traditions be- 
queathed by the founders and continuators of this great Republic. 

To sum up, Armenia is Europe and America is Asia in the bud. 
Let western civilization take care of it. It is a bud out of which 
will develop fresh elements of aesthetic, moral, and spiritual progress. 
The Armenian race, by its strong national, religious, and philosophi- 
cal turn of mind, is the equal of all the fine, sensitive natures among 
the peoples of Europe and America. Her cause therefore appeals 
strongly to every State and people, all of whom should agree to 
grant to Armenia that which she wants and demands at the close of i 
this gi-eat war ; namely, complete freedom and national independence, i 

O LIBRftRY OF CONGRESS 



IIIIIIIIIIIIHII 

Pi nun ncn '^•^■^ ^ 



